Sabic to shut Netherlands unit for maintenance

London, September 4, 2013

Saudi Basic Industries Corp (Sabic) will shut one of two crackers at its Netherlands plant for maintenance later this month, one of several outages expected at petrochemical plants in coming weeks.

There have also been announcements of turnarounds at Dow's Spanish plant and one of Braskem's Brazil crackers, while Total is expected to permanently close one of its petrochemical units.

These plants run on oil product naphtha or liquefied petroleum gas, which includes propane and butane, derived either from associated gas at oilfields or refineries.

Traders said the closure of the petrochemicals units was unlikely to undermine demand for naphtha, which has been unusually buoyant this week due largely to refinery run cuts and maintenance outages, notably at Algeria's Skikda refinery.

The Olefins 4 cracker at Sabic's Geleen will close for six weeks from September 15 for routine maintenance work and as part of a 135 million euro ($178 million) upgrade to increase energy efficiency, a company spokeswoman said.

"We do have a big turnaround. It's the usual turnaround we do every six years but this year we also have a big upgrade," spokeswoman Danielle Willems told Reuters.

The upgrade will reduce the cracker's energy consumption by eight percent and increase production by two percent, the company said when it announced the investment. - Reuters